Grove City: Scammers obtain money from business, resident

Monday

Sep 30, 2019 at 6:05 PMSep 30, 2019 at 6:57 PM

Grove City police are investigating two reports of scams conducted via phones.

An employee of a store in the 2800 block of London Groveport Road told police a man tricked her into punching numbers into a store phone's key pad that resulted in unauthorized prepaid card transactions totaling $2,100.

The woman said she took a call on a store phone at 7:20 p.m. Sept. 20 from a man who claimed to be with technical support at Western Union. The the man told her to enter several numbers on the phone's key pad to place the device into what he called "training mode," reports stated.

The woman said the man instructed her to enter numbers to test the key pad. Once she finished pressing the numbers, the man hung up.

The employee said she called Western Union and a representative told her they had not been in contact with her or the store. Further investigation revealed the numbers the man had asked her to enter were card numbers and money amounts which were wired to prepaid cards, according to reports.

There is no evidence of where or to whom the money was sent, reports stated.

In the second case, a resident of the 3800 block of Glenna Avenue reported he received a call at 7 p.m. Sept. 19 from a man regarding the virus protection on his computer.

The victim said the man referenced the name of the company he uses for virus protection. The caller said the company required $366 to renew the virus protection, according to reports.

When the victim told the caller he had already paid for a lifetime subscription, the man said the company had changed its policy and he owed $366.

The victim then told the man he wanted to cancel his subscription and the caller said he could arrange that but he had already debited the $366 from his account. He said he would need the victim's bank account information to put the money back into his account.

The victim told police he provided his account information and the caller assured him the money had been put back into his account, then hung up.

A short time later, the victim received a second call in which the caller said he had accidentally put $2,100 into the man's account and he asked the victim to withdraw $1,700 and send him the amount through a money-transfer service. The remaining $400 would represent the $366 refund plus the cost of the money transfer service.

The victim went to a store in the 1600 block of Stringtown Road where he wired the money to a store located in Massachusetts and addressed it to a woman whose name the caller had provided.

The next day, the victim discovered his account information had been used to transfer a total of $2,100 from his account into another unknown account.

In other recent Grove City police reports:

* A representative of a Columbus company said a car his firm is leasing from a rental company was stolen Sept. 25 from a parking lot in the 3300 block of Lewis Centre Way. A surveillance camera at a nearby business recorded a car pulling up next to the rental vehicle and a man exiting the second car, getting into the rental vehicle and driving away. The keys were left in the unlocked car, which is valued at $35,000, reports stated.

* An employee of a Loveland company told police Sept. 25 tools were stolen from two boxes on his work truck while he was staying at a hotel in the 1800 block of Stringtown Road. The locks on the tool boxes were punched out to gain access to the tools, according to reports. Total loss was $7,400.

* An Orient man told police he left his cellphone Sept. 23 on a bench in the 3900 block of Broadway. About two hours after he left the bench, he realized he had left the phone. He went back and discovered the phone was gone.